ESPN’s Monday Night Football tilt between the Chicago Bears and Detroit Lions was a success for ESPN and the city of Detroit – but not for the Bears. The game on WCIU earned a 13.4 household rating and a 20 share while ESPN pulled a 18.8/27, combining for an overall 32.2/47, easily outdrawing other series in the Chicago market, including […]
The Simpsons has been renewed for two years. Let’s go to Moe’s to celebrate! That is, if he let us… In news that has dominated TV news headlines all week long, there was drama on whether The Simpsons‘ voice actors would agree to take a 45 percent pay cut – or cancel the […]
But you no longer can’t with Monique and soon, you won’t be able to with George Lopez, either. (Editor’s Note: This post was originally published on August 3, 2011. -T.H.) Late-night has become a rather bizarre place lately – outside of the usual nuttiness of course – with an insomniac sheep running around, […]
It’s an special edition of T Dog’s Six Pack – a supersized one with nine items related to last week’s upfronts in New York as advertisers, media buyers, and the networks now have the hardest job ahead of them – negotiations. Here are the hits and misses from last week’s presentations: Epic successes:The return of the sitcom. Just when you’ve […]
Ah, lucky Providence, R.I. They get to see women in bras in the prime access hour. We Chicagoans get Bill Kurtis and Walter Jacobson. You know, it’s hard to be a bra salesman these days in Providence when you have the Internet… and now you have infomercials running as early as 7 p.m.! Is it no surprise that 25% of […]
Des Moines, Ia. –based Meredith Corp., owner of CBS affiliate WGCL-TV in Atlanta, has agreed to take over day-today operations of Turner Broadcasting’s WPCH-TV (aka Peachtree TV) in a local marketing agreement giving Meredith control of the station’s marketing, promotions, advertising, and technical operations while Turner stays on as owner and licensee. The deal takes effect in the next few […]
Conan’s excited to be on TBS. Monday finally marked former NBC late-night host Conan O’Brien venture into basic cable on a network which was once stood as a momument to Ted Turner. Conan’s conquest of the Turner Broadcasting System started in essence with an overnight rating of 2.8 for his Monday premiere. But it gets better: – The program drew […]
..and other media news of note: – Kevin Manno is exiting his afternoon gig at alt-rock WKQX-FM (Q101) to take a job hosting a yet-to-be named weekday show on MTV according to CRM. The new show debuts on September 20 and is scheduled to air weekdays at 5 p.m. Manno’s old shift is being filled temporarily by James VanOdsol. This […]
Three up, three down: The best and worst in media during the past week: What’s Hot. The Final Answer: Pay up, Mickey Mouse. A grand jury ruled in favor of Celador after The Walt Disney Co. skimmed the Who Wants To Be A Millionaire producer out of millions of dollars, thanks to “Hollywood Accounting.” The jury awarded Celador $269 million, […]
Yes, T Dog’s Four Pack is back! But due to the struggling economy (ha, ha), yours truly is forced to cut one each from the winners’ pack and the losers’ pack – and merge the rest together to form T Dog’s Six Pack – three winners and three losers each in the same post – plus, Six Pack is a […]
Off-net sitcom clears five more markets. Weigel’s WDJT/WMLW in Milwaukee gets syndie rights to show. Warner Bros. red-hot Big Bang Theory has now cleared five more markets a month after the show cleared ten Fox-owned and operated stations, including WFLD-TV and WPWR-TV in Chicago. Among the five markets cleared is Milwaukee, whose CBS-affiliated WDJT-TV purchased the show to air on […]
It’s the 2010-11 Turner upfront presentation, and you know who is the man of the hour. I’m talking about Conan O’Brien, TBS’ new late night star, who stopped yesterday at the event to say hi to media buyers (and to convince him he’s the real deal in a daypart dominated by David Letterman and Jay Leno.) O’Brien woke the quasi-sleepy […]
WFLD/WPWR picks up show as part of ten-market Fox deal Warner Bros. Domestic Television Distribution has sold The Big Bang Theory to Fox-owned stations and Turner Broadcasting for a fall 2011 start. The cable deal has TBS paying a record-breaking $1.5 million per episode (for a cable network) for the rights to air the show in primetime four or […]
CBS and Turner Broadcasting announced a mega-deal that will keep at least some of the NCAA Tournament on the Tiffany network – but much of it is moving to cable. In an eye-popping 14-year, $10.8 billion deal struck on Wednesday, CBS and Turner’s family of networks – TNT, TBS, and TruTV (formerly CourtTV) will carry both the preliminary and second […]
The winners and losers of the week: The stamp of approval: The Chicago Blackhawks (before Friday’s night’s loss): The Mighty Blackhawks are mighty once again thanks to record-breaking regular season ratings. The Hawks are in the playoffs against the Nashville Predators, which continue Sunday night. Go Hawks! Conan moving to TBS. Fox getting out-foxed by Conan. While Murdoch and the […]
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